This month’s issue of Time magazine strikes up unique opinions
Mothers breastfeeding toddlers, sharing a bed and wearing their children in slings are all advocated by this month’s Time magazine cover. The Baby Book by Dr. Bill and Martha Sears promotes the “attachment parenting” method in the issue, and the cover features a slender 26-year-old woman breastfeeding her 3-year-old son while standing. The mother featured in the Time magazine cover photo, Jamie Lynne Grumet, is supportive of the method.
The method’s objective is to raise compassionate individuals. The Attachment Parenting International website reads, “It eliminates violence as a means for raising children, and ultimately helps to prevent violence in society as a whole.”
Financial Times columnist Gillian Tett, as well as Morning Joe co-host Mika Brzezisnki, express their disappointment in the concept. Both argued that the cover was mainly a profile-builder for Sears.
The new Time magazine cover proclaims an aim to promote “attachment parenting,” apparently more effective for children’s growth than those children who do not form close bonds with their primary caregivers.
Some are more taken aback by the concept of breastfeeding children who are of older age; though, others are more alarmed by the photos themselves. Inside the issue are additional images of women breastfeeding their children who are well past the age of infancy.
The photographer, Martin Schoeller, commented on what it was like during the photoshoot. Schoeller said, “When you think of breast-feeding, you think of mothers holding their children, which was impossible with some of these older kids,” adding, “I liked the idea of having the kids standing up to underline the point that this was an uncommon situation.”
